CD Review – ‘Sweet Home Alabama – The Country Music Tribute to Lynyrd Skynyrd’

14 years ago Liv Carter Comments Off on CD Review – ‘Sweet Home Alabama – The Country Music Tribute to Lynyrd Skynyrd’

‘Sweet Home Alabama – The Country Music Tribute to Lynyrd Skynyrd’ – Various Artists (2010)

 

Eight country artists pay tribute to iconic southern rockers Lynyrd Skynyrd on this new compilation album, ‘Sweet Home Alabama – The Country Music Tribute to Lynyrd Skynyrd’.

One of the best things about projects like this is hearing artists step slightly outside of their comfort zone and do something different. Eric Church, whose version of ‘The Ballad of Curtis Loew’ opens the record, manages the difficult feat of adding his own sound without hurting the original song. It ends up sounding heavier than his usual material but he has enough rocker in him to get it right. 

‘Simple Man’, performed by Randy Houser, is every bit as impactful as the original with an incredibly strong vocal performance. Equally vocally strong is the other Randy. On ballad ‘Tuesday’s Gone’, Randy Montana delivers a great interpretation.     

With just a dobro for company, Jamey Johnson took on ‘Four Wall of Raiford’. It’s perfect; plain and simple. On the opposite end of the volume scale is the Eli Young Band‘s thunderous version of ‘Gimme Three Steps’; a real highlight of this album. Shooter Jennings recorded the vocals for ‘Call Me the Breeze’ in his hotel room whilst on tour. Perhaps because of this, his voice gives this soul-soaked toetapper a worldweary quality.

Perhaps the most surprising to me was Uncle Kracker‘s version of ‘All I Can Do Is Write About It’. The unhurried beat and banjos pair perfectly with his distinctive vocals.

Ashley Ray closes the album with anthem ‘Sweet Home Alabama’. Though I love her voice on pretty much everything she does, this acoustic version at half the tempo of the original doesn’t really do much for me. It’s got very little energy and that’s a waste of Ashley’s talent.           

Produced (and on more than one occasion overproduced – my only problem with this CD) by Jay Joyce, this collection is a great tribute to truly timeless songs.

‘Sweet Home Alabama – The Country Music Tribute to Lynyrd Skynyrd’ will be released exclusively through Wal-Mart on July 20, 2010. 

Disclosure of material connection for this review. 
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Liv Carter

Liv Carter

Liv is a career coach for creatives, and the people who work with them.
She holds several certificates from Berklee College of Music, and a certificate in Positive Psychology from UC Berkeley.
Her main influences are coffee, cats, and Alexander Hamilton.
Liv Carter

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